Electric cars may be required to make noise

Members of the media look photograph the charging port on the Chevy Spark EV during it's world debut at the LA Auto Show in Los Angeles, Wednesday, Nov. 28, 2012. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

Photo By Stephan Savoia/Associated Press

A Japan Airlines Boeing 787 Dreamliner jet aircraft is surrounded by emergency vehicles while parked at a terminal E gate at Logan International Airport in Boston as a fire chief looks into the cargo hold Monday, Jan. 7, 2013. A small electrical fire filled the cabin of the JAL aircraft with smoke Monday morning about 15 minutes after it landed in Boston. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia)

SAFETY

Electric vehicles may get noisier

Electric cars, which have soundless engines, would need to make noises to let pedestrians know they're near under a new federal proposal released Monday.

Sounds would need to be detectable when vehicles are traveling slower than 18 mph so electric and hybrid-electric cars can be heard by bicyclists and pedestrians, particularly the visually impaired, under the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration rule.

The quiet-car rule, which would have to be made final before it takes effect, would save 35 lives over each model year of hybrid vehicles and prevent 2,800 injuries, the agency said. Adding external speakers to quiet vehicles would cost about $25 million a year, or about $35 per light vehicle, NHTSA said.

AVIATION

Dreamliner fire investigated

U.S. officials are investigating a fire on a Boeing Co. 787 Dreamliner in Boston after a Japan Airlines flight from Tokyo, the latest setback for the jet following electrical faults on other planes last month.

Boeing's newest model has been plagued by incidents since it entered commercial service in late 2011. The Dreamliner is the first jet with a fuselage made chiefly of composite materials instead of aluminum and has more electrically operated systems than other airliners.

TECHNOLOGY

Dish enhancing viewer tracking

Dish Network, the second-largest U.S. satellite provider, is developing a feature that would let advertisers see what people are watching in real time, setting the stage for last-minute auctions of ad space.

The company is looking to build on a viewership-tracking service introduced in November on its Hopper set-top boxes. The feature, called "What's Hot Now," allows Hopper users to see what other Dish customers are watching and flip to the most popular programs.

By collecting real-time data through set-top boxes, Dish may develop a new way for the industry to sell advertisements, said Warren Schlichting, Dish's senior vice president of media sales and analytics. The move also could improve the company's relationship with advertisers, the victims of a technology that Dish introduced to skip commercials using a single button on a remote control.

RETAIL

Amazon stock hits record high

Amazon.com, the world's largest online retailer, surged to a record high after Morgan Stanley said the company's vast network of distribution centers will help it win share as the global e-commerce market expands.

The stock advanced 3.6 percent to $268.46 Monday, after earlier hitting $269.30, its highest intraday price since the shares began trading in 1997. Morgan Stanley upgraded Amazon to overweight from equal-weight and maintained its $325 price per share estimate.

Amazon is investing across the company to boost the volume of products sold on its site, adding features to its Kindle line of e-readers and tablets and beefing up its inventory and shipping network.

ECONOMY

Health care spending slows

Health care spending in the U.S. grew at less than half the pre-recession level for the third straight year in 2011, as employers continued to shift medical costs to workers in a tight economy and state governments limited payouts to Medicaid, the health plan for the poor.

National health care spending, which accounts for almost one-fifth of gross domestic product, grew 3.9 percent to $2.7 trillion in 2011, economists at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said in a report published Monday in the journal Health Affairs. Growth had been close to 8 percent before the U.S. entered an 18-month recession in December 2007.

Spending on Medicare, the federal health program for the elderly and disabled, grew at a faster pace compared with 2010. Out-of-pocket spending by consumers rose 2.8 percent in 2011, compared with 2.1 percent in 2010, according to the CMS economists' report.